mniemiec wrote:All but one of the above syntheses (#4) improve the state of the art. Congratulations! 6 of them can be slightly improved, by tightening up initial still-life synthesis and/or final cleanup:

Thanks. I'm not currently trying to optimize the syntheses I make, just make them below 15 gliders. I stop improving them once they're below 15 gliders.

Here are 5 15-bit still lifes with a price of less than 1 glider/bit.
15.1319 (15G->13G):

The challenge proposed by the Goldtiger997, very interesting. According to my data from the 15-bit still lifes have 51 cost equal to 1 glider/bit and 93 cost great 1 glider/bit. The highest cost at 15.619 (33G).

I noticed that same problem happens quite a few times in the file "still14.rar" that was posted last October. Some time ago I wrote a glider synthesis analyser but I never found time to polish it up and publish it. With the current interest in glider synthesis I really should.

chris_c wrote:In this synthesis (and also 15.1287 (16G->11G)) the gliders in white are not compatible if you rewind: ...

Eek! This is probably my fault. I use that 5-glider add-siamese-carrier component in many syntheses; I had never realized that it was invalid. This is not a serious problem, because it has since been obsoleted by the following 5-glider component:

chris_c wrote:I noticed that same problem happens quite a few times in the file "still14.rar" that was posted last October.

I will have to go back through all my syntheses and check for this also.

chris_c wrote:Some time ago I wrote a glider synthesis analyser but I never found time to polish it up and publish it. With the current interest in glider synthesis I really should.

This would be quite useful. It would be very nice to have an automated tool to verify all the syntheses in my database; there are currently over 11000 of them, and checking them by hand is very time-consuming and error-prone.

chris_c wrote:In this synthesis (and also 15.1287 (16G->11G)) the gliders in white are not compatible if you rewind: ...

Eek! This is probably my fault. I use that 5-glider add-siamese-carrier component in many syntheses; I had never realized that it was invalid. This is not a serious problem, because it has since been obsoleted by the following 5-glider component:

chris_c wrote:I noticed that same problem happens quite a few times in the file "still14.rar" that was posted last October.

I will have to go back through all my syntheses and check for this also.

chris_c wrote:Some time ago I wrote a glider synthesis analyser but I never found time to polish it up and publish it. With the current interest in glider synthesis I really should.

This would be quite useful. It would be very nice to have an automated tool to verify all the syntheses in my database; there are currently over 11000 of them, and checking them by hand is very time-consuming and error-prone.

Thank! This and my fault. I forgot the commandment of Reagan's speech in Russian: "doveray no proveray" (trust but verify). Quote corrected versions 15.1317 and 15.1287:

Apple Bottom wrote:This xq4 showed up in D8_1: ...
Unlike some previous four-*WSS xq4s, I think this one is a proper flotilla; the ships are close enough to each other that there's cells in between the MWSSes and LWSSes that are influenced by both: ...
But the LifeWiki article isn't as clear on what precisely constitutes a flotilla as it could be.

The MWSS on MWSS is a proper flotilla, as the two MWSS affect each other. However, the MWSS and LWSS are far enough apart that they do not form a single object (e.g. they share no cells in common, and there is no cell in either one that is affected by the other). Their connection is at least as tenuous as two adjacent tubs or two adjacent blinkers (and actually even more so, because empty cells that the two share in common are not shared at the same time), and those aren't considered objects, or even pseudo-objects.

mniemiec wrote:The MWSS on MWSS is a proper flotilla, as the two MWSS affect each other. However, the MWSS and LWSS are far enough apart that they do not form a single object (e.g. they share no cells in common, and there is no cell in either one that is affected by the other). Their connection is at least as tenuous as two adjacent tubs or two adjacent blinkers (and actually even more so, because empty cells that the two share in common are not shared at the same time), and those aren't considered objects, or even pseudo-objects.

Ah, I see. Thank you for the clarification!

If you speak, your speech must be better than your silence would have been. — Arabian proverb

The soup collapses quickly to form the oscillator. I suppose constructibility might be lurking somewhere in there between T=6 and T=14 -- the 10-11 range looks vaguely promising, but probably pretty far beyond my synthesis skills.

thunk wrote:Thank you AB. Got a new computer recently, and concentrated once again on D8_1 and D8_4 which have produced some very interesting results in the past.

You're welcome, pardner. *tips hat* Credit where credit is due.

Good point about the D8 symmetries. I've pointed one of the two dedicated D2_+2 searchers I've currently got running at a new target; sorta doubt I'll find much new, but you never know. (I'll keep one D2_+2 searcher running for now to look for more copperheads.)

As for the new p6 -- worth a LifeWiki article, maybe?

If you speak, your speech must be better than your silence would have been. — Arabian proverb

I'm not sure whether the synthesis that produces it in a pseudo-still life (http://conwaylife.com/forums/viewtopic. ... =75#p20380) is able to do it cheaper by deleting the loaf, but I only found out about that after having completed the above. At the very least it uses a new mechanism of construction.

Sphenocorona wrote:I spent some time trying to reduce Super pond synthesis, which was listed at 24 gliders, and got it to 13G: ...
I'm not sure whether the synthesis that produces it in a pseudo-still life (http://conwaylife.com/forums/viewtopic. ... =75#p20380) is able to do it cheaper by deleting the loaf, but I only found out about that after having completed the above. At the very least it uses a new mechanism of construction.

Chris Cain created a 7-glider synthesis of this on 2015-03-01. In fact, this is the exact method used to produce the referenced pseudo-still-life; that is made using this mechanism, and simultaneously adding a loaf with 3 additional gliders. Although your new mechanism is not optimal in this case, it might provide some useful tools for synthesizing other super-sized still-lifes.